Locker Talk
by burkygirl
Summary: An Everlark high school romance, written 500 words at a time.
1. Chapter 1

Peeta Mellark stacked his Physics textbook on top of his binder and swept the stack into his arms. He ran his fingers through his blonde hair and checked his watch. Four minutes to the next bell. If he timed it just right, he'd make it.

"Hey Peet," called his buddy, Thresh, who pointed a dark finger in his direction. "Hold up a sec."

Peeta waved him off. "Catch you at lunch, man, gotta get to my locker and then down to Mrs. Coin's history class before the bell rings."

Three minutes, he noted when he checked his watch again as he crossed the mezzanine to the other wing of the school where his locker was located. He rounded the corner and grinned.

This was the best part of his day, even if she didn't know it yet. Katniss Everdeen was leaning against his locker like she did every afternoon, giggling with her friend Madge as Madge exchanged what he thought were Advanced English books for what was definitely math. Katniss's dark hair was in its typical braid, tossed carelessly over her shoulder where it lay in a straight line over a flannel shirt that floated over trim hips snugly tucked into a pair of skinny jeans.

His mouth watered, then it went as dry as cotton. He licked his lips and praised the locker assignment gods for the four-hundredth time. Katniss's daily presence more than made up for his other locker neighbour, Cato Coughlin, who spent every lunch break tongue wrestling with his girlfriend, Clove Jones; sprawled against Cato's locker door and Peeta's as well.

He shook his head to chase that disturbing image from his mind and tapped Katniss on the shoulder.

Her silver eyes flicked to his, startled as always by his presence.

"Excuse me," he said with a grin. "That's my locker."

"Oh!" she exclaimed as she moved away. "Sorry about that. I'm always doing that, aren't I?"

"It's okay," he croaked a shrug and began to spin the dial on his lock, trying to resist the urge to beat his head against the door. _It's okay?_ Fuck. What happened to the ten funny things he practiced in the mirror that morning?

Madge fastened the lock on her own locker and gave Peeta a wry grin, shaking her head. "See ya later, Peeta." Katniss said nothing, just wrapped her arms more tightly around her books.

He peered around the corner to watch the two girls move down the hall to their next class, heads bent together as they continued their conversation. Their hips swayed in unison as they moved along. They were a study in contrasts; Katniss's raven braid and Madge's blonde curls, Madge's fair skin and Katniss's olive complexion. His mind had already wandered to how her hand would look intertwined with his when Katniss's gaze flicked over her shoulder and connected with Peeta's. His heart stuttered and his lips were just twitching into a smile when she turned her attention back to Madge.

He whipped his History textbook out of his locker and grabbed his binder. He'd just have to try harder tomorrow.


	2. Chapter 2

Peeta and Thresh shoved each other out the door of their Law class on their way to the cafeteria. Peeta was already dreaming of tacos for lunch when Thresh jabbed Peeta in the gut with his elbow and then wiggled his eyebrows at the girls. Peeta gave Thresh a sly grin and his blue eyes twinkled with mischief. They'd been doing this every day for weeks.

The two of them approached Madge and Delly, who were sitting on the floor with their backs to Delly's locker, totally engrossed in their phones. Faster than lightning, their hands snaked out to grab the girls by their ankles and dragged them out onto the floor. Delly was still squealing and kicking in an attempt to make Peeta let her go when Katniss walked out of her French class, located right across the hall from Delly's locker.

Peeta dropped Delly's feet to the floor with a thud, ignoring her yelp of pain when her ankles hit the floor. He shoved his hands in the pockets of his jeans. "Hey Katniss," he said, as she approached. Katniss shot him a scowl worthy of the Grumpy Cat t-shirt she had on under her hoodie and turned her attention to Thresh, her expression turning into an amused quirk of her lips.

"Thresh, what exactly are you doing to my friend?"

Thresh, still holding tight to Madge's ankles, gave Katniss an unrepentant grin. His eyes danced and his straight white teeth lit up his entire face. "Oh hey, Kat. You know. What we do best. Tease the girls, right Peet?"

Katniss rolled her eyes at Thresh. "You never change," she sighed. They knew each other, Peeta remembered. Thresh had dated Katniss's friend Rue for over a year. In fact, Peeta figured his gentle giant friend probably still had a thing for the pixie-like Rue. He hadn't gone out with another girl since their break-up a few months back.

"-you, Peeta?" Katniss asked.

"What? Sorry," he apologized, hoping the heat on his cheeks wasn't too apparent. "I didn't quite catch that."

Katniss shook her head. "I asked if he was corrupting you," she repeated, the slight crease in her brow giving away her annoyance. _Just great_ , he thought. _She thinks I'm an idiot_.

Thresh slapped Peeta on the back. "He taught me everything I know. Didn't ya, Peet?"

"On the wrestling mat, maybe," Peeta replied.

"Well, you better watch out, Kat. You never know when we might take you by surprise."

Katniss's silver eyes rolled again. "Good luck with that, Thresh." She turned her attention back to Madge and Delly, who had resumed their positions against the locker. "Madge, are you going to have lunch in the cafeteria today?"

Peeta only half listened to Madge's polite refusal, something about working on a project with Delly. Instead, he was watching the look of disappointment on Katniss's face as she waved to her friend. He'd just opened his mouth to invite her to eat with him and Thresh when she waved to the group and headed down the hall.

"It is _so_ on, Kat," called Thresh.

She smirked at them over her shoulder and disappeared around the corner.


	3. Chapter 3

The next day, Peeta and Thresh were laughing uncontrollably as they mounted the back stairs from chemistry class on their way to Peeta's locker.

"Marv's eyebrows are never gonna be the same," Thresh chortled.

Peeta guffawed. "Did have see his face when the smoke cleared?

Thresh froze in place, mimicking Marvel Williams' stunned expression only minutes before when the his incorrectly mixed chemicals exploded.

As Peeta laughed, they crossed the threshold to the second floor and Thresh nudged Peeta with his elbow. "Peet." He nodded down the hall. Peeta followed his gaze. There was Katniss on her tip toes, reaching high above her head into the top shelf of her locker, the tiny orange denim shorts she was wearing creeping up her thighs. They were a beacon calling out to him. The hallway's temperature rose five or 10 degrees. "Go get her, man."

Peeta blushed. Were his feelings so obvious? "What? I-"

Thresh grinned. "I told her she was next on our hit list. She doubted our skills. It's up to you, dude. Defend our honor." He shoved Peeta forward.

Clearly, there was no getting out of this. Peeta moved toward Katniss, his heart racing with a potent mix of dread and excitement that made his head swim. Her textbook clutched to her black t-shirt, she was rifling through her backpack now, a pencil clenched in her teeth. Peeta's hand was practically shaking as he reached out, planning to touch her side and startle her. The fabric of her shirt was barely brushing the tips of his fingers when she spoke.

"Hi Peeta." Silver eyes flicked over her shoulder to him and then a curtain of inky hair fell forward she resumed digging in her bag. "You didn't seriously think that would work did you?"

"Um-"

"Ah, found it!" She whipped out her calculator and then looked at him again, tossing her hair over her shoulder. "You'll have to work harder than that, Mellark, if you're planning to surprise me. I've got eyes in the back of my head."

Finally, Peeta found his tongue and leaned against her open locker door. She smelled like a summer's day and her voice sounded severe, but her eyes were laughing. He offered her a lazy grin. "Oh yeah? Sounds like a challenge, Everdeen. I do like a challenge." He wondered if that sounded douchy. He played it through his head again and decided it did.

Katniss didn't seem to notice. She grabbed a binder, restacked her books against her chest and gave him a considering look before pulling her door out from under his hands and slamming it shut, slapping the lock closed. "I'd like to see you try, Peeta. But I think you've met your match in me."

She flounced away toward Thresh where he stood watching the entire exchange, a dopey grin on his face. Katniss flipped him the bird. "That was your doing," she sneered.

Thresh said something smart in reply, but Peeta didn't catch it. He was too busy thinking over her last words. _I think you've met your match in me_.

Oh, he most assuredly had.


	4. Chapter 4

When Peeta arrived at his locker after Physics a few days later, he was unable to mask his disappointment. No Katniss. Again. He'd begun to think she was deliberately avoiding him after their last encounter by her locker.

He spun his lock - 12-47-26 - then snapped it open, reaching in to exchange his Physics books for History. He stretched up on his toes to root around for a spare pen, when something grabbed his sides. He startled with a shout and whipped around, but no one was behind him. He looked around frantically, finally spotting a long braid whipping around the corner.

He spent the rest of the week in a state of high alert. Each time he let down his guard and relaxed, sharp fingers probed his sides and sent him shooting into the air, searching everywhere for her slim figure or her signature hairstyle.

Thresh thought it was hilarious.

"She's awesome, man," Thresh slapped his large hand against his knee as they sat in the cafeteria having lunch. Well, Peeta was eating, all the while scanning the room, afraid he'd toss his plate of fries sky-high at any moment.

"I don't think it's awesome," Peeta grumbled, more used to being the prankster than the pranked.

Thresh titled his chair backwards until it hit the wall behind him and he was balanced on two legs.

"No, man, she is sick. I watched her sneak up on you yesterday. Her steps are silent, man. She tracks you like a hunter. And wicked fast! That girl is out of your reach before you even know what's happening."

Peeta resisted the urge to kick Thresh's chair out from under him. His sides ached from where her fingers drove into his sides; his ego was bruised and he longed to see her face, maybe even stammer out a few words.

"C'mon Peet," Thresh cajoled him. "You need to look on the bright side."

"And what's that, oh wise one?" Peeta could hear the snap in his voice. He didn't care.

Thresh dropped the legs of his chair to the floor and leaned his elbows on the table. His smile was full of straight white teeth. "Katniss Everdeen puts her hands on you about four times a day."

"I guess." He hadn't looked at the situation quite like that. He picked through his fries, looking for one with exactly the right amount of ketchup on it.

"You guess?" Thresh's voice was incredulous. "Peeta, you've had a hard-on for her since middle school. And now she's tracking you through the halls all day? Wake the fuck up! She's into you."

Peeta shook his head and ate another forkful of fries. "Nah. I don't think so. She hasn't even spoken to me in a week. Have you ever met a girl like that?"

Thresh laughed. "Peet, I think we can agree that Katniss Everdeen is not like most girls."

Peeta downed his soda and pushed his tray away. "Whatever, man. I'm gonna go get ready for chemistry."


	5. Chapter 5

Trudging back to his locker, Peeta's mind was so deeply focused on his misery that he almost didn't see her there, leaning against the door, nearly drowning in the beat up leather jacket he knew she liked to wear.

His heart sped up and he managed to stammer out a greeting. "Um, hi."

One of Katniss's eyebrows quirked upward. "Ready to discuss the terms of your surrender, Mellark?"

"My what?"

"Your surrender. Admit I'm better at your game than you are and we'll go our separate ways."

He shifted his books on his hips and stared her down. "Don't see how I could see you less than I do at the moment."

Katniss caught the corner of her lip in her teeth and stared down at the floor between their feet. "You dared me," she insisted. "And I won."

He was pretty sure this weird, paranoid, embarrassing week wasn't what he'd had in mind the other day.

"What you said was that I couldn't surprise you," he reminded her. "We didn't discuss terms."

Katniss's arms crossed defensively. "What did you have in mind, Mellark?"

"If I take you by surprise, just once, you let me take you to the spring dance." Watching her eyes widen to saucer-size gave him a sense of satisfaction he hadn't felt all week.

"And if you don't?"

He shrugged. "Name your terms."

"You have to admit that I won," she insists.

"That's it?"

"That's all I want."

"Alright, Everdeen. You're on." He stuck out his hand to shake. She stared at it a second then clasped his in her own. He'd expected the firmness of her handshake. He was unprepared for the jolt it sent up his arm. Their eyes locked and he wondered if she felt it too. Her hand fell hastily to her side.

"See you around, Peeta." She beat a retreat down the hall.

Peeta spun the lock on his locker and grinned. Katniss Everdeen had no idea what was in store for her.

* * *

"C'mon, Haymitch, I really need that book out of my locker," Peeta cajoled.

"It's nine o'clock at night. You should have come earlier, before the hockey game came on." The night custodian eyed him suspiciously in the glow of the old television perched on top of a battered file cabinet."Whatcha got in that backpack, Boy?"

Peeta tried not to gag on the fumes of Haymitch's whiskey breath and shrugged. "Just my other homework. I figured I'd return it tonight. Save hauling it over here tomorrow. So, is it alright with you if I run upstairs. Ten minutes, promise. You can time me."

The corner of the older man's mouth twitched down. "Make it five, Boy. I'm timin' ya."

"Thanks!" Peeta called out as he pelted down the hall and up the stairs toward the area where his locker waited. He spun the combination, grabbed his math book and slammed it closed, then raced around the winding corridor to the spot where Katniss's locker was located.

Number 248. With a smile on his lips, he extracted his surprise from his backpack and taped it to her locker door.

Five minutes and thirty seconds after leaving Haymitch's office for the first time, the older man was locking the door of the school behind him.

Peeta whistled all the way home.


	6. Chapter 6

He barely had his coat off the next morning when she pounced.

Katniss's grey eyes sparked in fury. "You!" she sputtered. "You tricked me!"

"K- Katniss. Just hold on a minute," Peeta's arms flew up defensively.

She brandished the bouquet of daisies in his face. He was relieved to see they were still in one piece and didn't wilt overnight. Those little water picks he stole from the kitchen drawer must have worked.

"I don't know how you managed to get them in here before I arrived, but I bet you had a good laugh over it, didn't you?"

"Laugh? What? No," he protested.

"Sure," she sneered. "It's all just another prank to you, isn't it?"

"Katniss-" he tried to cut in.

"Well guess what, Peeta? It's not funny."

Turning his back on her, he slammed his locker and jabbed the lock closed. Taking a deep breath, he turned to face her, shoving his hands in his pockets. "You said I couldn't take you by surprise, but it sure seems like I did. I wasn't trying to embarrass you or piss you off. Most girls would think it was sweet."

She scoffed. "Well, I'm not like any of the other girls you've bought flowers for."

He looked down at the yellow daisies in their green cellophane wrapper. They'd seemed so cheerful in the grocery store display. He'd been hoping for a reaction from Katniss, but never considered they'd cause this level of drama.

He cleared his throat nervously. "I've never bought a girl flowers before."

Katniss's gaze fell to the flowers and when her eyes met his again, the temper in them had banked to a simmer. "Never? Not even for a girl you're taking on a date?"

Peeta didn't date, not really. Mostly, he just went out with friends in mixed groups and enjoyed the company of whoever among the girls was unattached that night. It was easy, uncomplicated. There was only one girl in the whole school he was seriously interested in, and she was not especially happy with him at the moment.

"Never."

Her pretty pink lips formed an O and she adjusted the flowers in her arms, holding them a little closer to her Guns 'n Roses t-shirt.

"You better put those away if they embarrass you."

Katniss shuffled her booted feet and nodded, turning to go back to her own locker. She only got a few steps away when he found his voice again.

"Hey Katniss?" She whipped around, looking puzzled. "What colour is your dress?"

"My what?"

A sly feeling stole over him. He finally had her off her guard. "Your dress? For the dance? What colour is it?"

Katniss gaped at him. "What?"

His arms crossed over his chest. "I won the bet. We're going to the dance together. So what color is your dress?"

Her silver eyes blinked twice.

"You're not gonna welch on me, are you?"

Katniss swallowed.

"Green," she choked. And then she fled, her dark braid trailing behind her.


	7. Chapter 7

Peeta straightened his tie in the rearview mirror of the decrepit Jeep he'd inherited from his brothers. He'd cleaned it thoroughly before this date, but nothing was going to change the fact that it was more body fill than steel and may have driven the equivalent of the circumference of the globe. Twice. _Whatever_ , he thought. _It got me here_. He pointed at himself in the mirror. "Don't screw this up."

Scooping up the bouquet of flowers from the passenger's seat, purchased from the florist this time, he jumped out of the car and made his way up the walk to the mini home Katniss shared with her mother and sister.

He was met at the door by a blue-eyed, blonde-haired sprite, who was practically dancing with excitement.

"Are you Peeta?" she asked through the screen door. He nodded and she swung the door wide. "Katniss is almost ready. Oh, are those for her? Lucky! She's so nervous, it's adorable. She's never been to a dance before. On a da-"

"Prim!" Katniss's voice rang firmly across the kitchen where she stood in the doorway. Prim clammed up but looked completely unabashed.

Peeta chanced a glimpse at his date. She stood twisting her fingers into knots in her knee-length dress. It was hunter green, if he had to guess. Her raven locks flowed freely over her bare shoulders and a single pearl was nestled in the hollow of her throat, suspended from a fine gold chain.

"Doesn't she look pretty, Peeta?" prompted Prim.

He found his voice.

"Yeah," he croaked, not taking his eyes off the beauty before him. "You, uh, look amazing, Katniss. These are for you." He thrust the bouquet toward her.

She blushed as she accepted the flowers, her inky black lashes falling against her cheek as she peered into the wrapping.

Prim swept in between them, scooping the posies from her sister's arms. "Let me just put them in water. I'll leave them on the table for you, Katniss, so you can enjoy them when you come home."

"That would be nice, Prim. Thanks." She cleared her throat and gave him a slight smile. "All set?"

"Not yet, not yet," called Prim from the kitchen, distress in her voice. "Mom said I had to get a picture, remember?"

Katniss rolled her eyes and heaved an enormous sigh. "Fine. Get out here then." Peeta did his best to stifle a laugh. Katniss's silver eyes flicked to his defensively. "What?"

He shook his head with a grin. "I know who the boss is around here, and it's not you."

Katniss's lips were still twisted into a rueful smile when Prim hustled out of the kitchen, fussing with an old camera. "Okay, you two. Get cozy." Katniss stepped closer to Peeta and faced her sister. "I said cozy!" insisted Prim, and Peeta slipped his arm around Katniss's waist. It felt exactly right to hold her. "Perfect," said a satisfied Prim. "Now smile."


End file.
